In plain words
Whatever kind of Vedāntin one may be, whatever Vedas, Śāstras, Itihāsas and Purāṇas one may have studied, what one must know first of all is the truth of the body! This body comes bearing the fruits of the karmas of many births.
“When you were born from your mother's womb, no necklaces of any kind were to be seen. But there is, there is one garland on your neck, the karmas of past births set in it; however many you did, counting all of them one by one, good or bad, not breaking off a single one, Brahmā gives you a heavy garland and sends you forth, a necklace strung with all your karmas.”
There is no minus of a single one, and no plus. Just as it is, Brahmā gives it to you and sends you forth. So for your good fortune and your ill fortune your own karmas are the cause, and nothing else.
All that is done to please God is yajña!
You must go on remembering God without a break, doing God's work and offering yajña to God. From the day you are born until the day you die, you are performing yajña all the while. What is yajña? All the karmas you do in daily life are forms of yajña. So you need not perform yajñas, yāgas and the like, or japa and tapas, as something apart. Serve good people. Relieve the sufferings of those around you. Through service to society alone can you win the grace of the Lord of all. Every man goes on doing his own karmas himself. After one karma he keeps starting another. Man's nature is not one that does one thing and is satisfied. He keeps hoping to do ever so many more. So the whole of human life is full of karma. Only when these karmas are filled with Dharma is Brahman attained. So we must perform all karmas to please God. Where there is the feeling “I am doing this,” that result, whether good or bad, comes to you alone. That cannot be yajña. What is done to please God, without the feeling of being the doer, becomes yajña.
You know: today, before the yajña was begun, they rubbed two sticks one against the other and brought forth fire. They began the yajña with natural fire, not with artificial fire. Like oil in sesame, like juice in fruit, like fragrance in a flower, fire is present in wood. But from one stick you cannot get fire. One stick must be rubbed against another. In the same way, if the fire of Jñāna is to arise in us, we must churn both the body and Manas.
Manas finds Śānti only when it is offered to God
For man, who strains after the unattainable with ceaseless toil, with endless activity, with boundless desires and with anguish he cannot understand, the fine lamps that show the way are the spiritual books. At sea there are lighthouses to give a sign to ships and steamers. In the same way, in the ocean of saṃsāra, the spiritual books are what show man the way. Just as we clean the body with water, we must purify Manas with Jñāna. Divinity does not come merely from bathing ten times a day. Inner cleanliness too is most necessary. Just as you give the body food three times a day, so you must give Manas food three times a day as well. These are what were called prātaḥ-sandhyā, mādhyāhna-sandhyā and sāyaṃ-sandhyā.